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The 2007 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) projected with high confidence that the conditions (drought and high temperatures) in the Southern Europe will worsen. It stated that this region that includes Portugal is already vulnerable and will experience a reduction in water availability, hydropower potential and crop yield and productivity. The evidence of such conditions have already struck Portugal when during the 2004-2005 hydrological year experienced one of its worst droughts in decades. Between June to September 2005, the whole country was classified as experiencing sever to extreme drought according to the Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI). At the same time, Portugal was developing its new Water Law based on the requirements of the so called Water Framework Directive of the European Union. Its Article 11 states that one of the basic and required measures is to promote efficient and sustainable use of water. As a consequence of these two factors, the Portuguese Government adopted a series of adaptation measures, one of them being a ten year National Program for Efficient Use of Water. This paper will present this program in its irrigation water use, analyse its effective efficiency and discuss advantages and disadvantages of the portfolio of measures that are being considered. Until recently, classical efficiency defined as the ratio of the beneficial output to input was mostly used to calculate irrigation water efficiency. But in this study, the effective efficiency (EE) indicator was used which is defined as the ratio of beneficial output to the effective demand. Beneficial output is essentially net evapotranspiration. The preliminary results show an EE of about 60% corresponding to an effective water demand of about 6.6 billion cubic meter per year. This quantity of water is more than 85% of total water demand in Portugal. The cost of supplying this amount of water is estimated to be about half a billion Euros per year resulting in about 200 millions of Euros of losses. ...

AbstractEffective efficiency (EE) is a water use performance indicator of a system, integrating net evapotranspiration, volumes of water in and out of the system (including reused water) and their qualities. In order to analyse the nature of management and its options in promoting efficiencies, an efficiency elasticity index (EEI) is developed using EE. The maximum value of EEI for a given net evapotranspiration sets a threshold value for EE under which the management of the system should be improved. This makes it possible to evaluate how good the management of a system is and allows the decision makers to analyse efficiency targets using a graphical approach (assuming that interventions have the same costs). Hypothetical examples and real irrigation cases from United States and Egypt show the practical utility of EE and the methodology developed through the use of EEI. It is also shown that classical efficiency should be used with caution.

Abstract. Since the settlement of S. Miguel Island (Azores), in the XV century, several earthquakes caused important human losses and severe damages on the island. Sete Cidades Volcano area, located in the westernmost part of the island, was attained by strong seismic crises of tectonic and volcanic origin and major events reached a maximum historical intensity of IX (European Macroseismic Scale 1998) in this zone. Aiming to evaluate the impact of a future major earthquakes, a field survey was carried out in ten parishes of Ponta Delgada County, located on the flanks of Sete Cidades volcano and inside it is caldera. A total of 7019 buildings were identified, being 4351 recognized as dwellings. The total number of inhabitants in the studied area is 11429. In this work, dwellings were classified according to their vulnerability to earthquakes (Classes A to F), using the structure types table of the EMS-98, adapted to the types of constructions made in the Azores. It was concluded that 76% (3306) of the houses belong to Class A, and 17% (740) to Class B, which are the classes of higher vulnerability. If the area is affected by a seismic event with intensity IX it is estimated, that 57% (2480) to 77% (3350) of the dwellings will partially or totally collapse and 15% (652) to 25% (1088) will need to be rehabilitated. In this scenario, considering the average of inhabitants per house for each parish, 82% (9372) to 92% (10515) of the population will be affected. The number of deaths, injured and dislodged people will pose severe problems to the civil protection authorities and will cause social and economic disruption in the entire archipelago.

Abstract. Sete Cidades is an active central volcano with a summit caldera located in the westernmost part of S. Miguel Island (Azores). Since the settlement of the Island, in the 15th century, many landslide events occurred in this volcano, causing extensive damages in buildings and infrastructures. The study of historical records and the observation of new occurrences showed that landslides in the region have been triggered by heavy rainfall periods, earthquakes and erosion. In order to assess landslide susceptibility at Sete Cidades Volcano, landslide scars and associated deposits were mapped through aerial photographs and field surveys. The obtained data were inserted in a GIS to produce a landslide distribution map. It was concluded that the high density landslide areas are related with (1) major scarp faults, (2) the margin of fluvial channels, (3) the sea cliffs and (4) volcanic landforms, namely the caldera wall. About 73% of the mapped events took place in areas where pyroclastic deposits are the dominant lithology and more than 77% occurred where slopes are equal or higher than 20°. These two parameters were integrated and used to generate a preliminary susceptibility map. The incorporation of vulnerability data into the GIS allowed concluding that 30% of dwellings and most of the roads on Sete Cidades Volcano are located in areas where landslide susceptibility is high to very high. Such conclusion should be taken into account for emergency and land use planning.

Abstract. On account of its tectonic setting, both seismic and volcanic events are frequent in the Azores archipelago. During the historical period earthquakes and seismic swarms of tectonic and/or volcanic origin have struck S. Miguel Island causing a significant number of casualties and severe damages. The information present in historical records made possible a new macroseismic analysis of these major events using the European Macroseismic Scale-1998 (EMS-98). Among the strongest earthquakes of tectonic origin that affected S. Miguel Island, six events were selected for this study. The isoseismal maps drawn for these events enabled the identification of areas characterized by anomalous values of seismic intensity, either positive or negative, to constrain epicentre locations and to identify some new seismogenic areas. Regarding seismic activity associated with volcanic phenomena six cases were also selected. For each of the studied cases cumulative intensity values were assessed for each locality. The distribution of local intensity values shows that the effects are not homogeneous within a certain distance from the eruptive centre, the area of major impacts relates with the eruptive style and damages equivalent to high intensities may occur in Furnas and Sete Cidades calderas. Combining all the historical macroseismic data, a maximum intensity map was produced for S. Miguel Island.

Abstract. The Azores archipelago is located in the Atlantic Ocean and is composed of nine volcanic islands. S. Miguel, the largest one, is formed by three active, E-W trending, trachytic central volcanoes with caldera (Sete Cidades, Fogo and Furnas). Chains of basaltic cinder cones link those major volcanic structures. An inactive trachytic central volcano (Povoação) and an old basaltic volcanic complex (Nordeste) comprise the easternmost part of the island. Since the settlement of the island early in the 15th century, several destructive landslides triggered by catastrophic rainfall episodes, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions occurred in different areas of S. Miguel. One unique event killed thousands of people in 1522. Houses and bridges were destroyed, roads were cut, communications, water and energy supply systems became frequently disrupted and areas of fertile land were often buried by mud. Based on (1) historical documents, (2) aerial photographs and (3) field observations, landslide sites were plotted on a topographic map, in order to establish a landslide density map for the island. Data obtained showed that landslide hazard is higher on (1) the main central volcanoes where the thickness of unconsolidated pyroclastic deposits is considerable high and (2) the old basaltic volcanic complex, marked by deep gullies developed on thick sequences of lava flows. In these areas, caldera walls, fault scarps, steep valley margins and sea cliffs are potentially hazardous.

Abstract. Geological hazards in the Azores archipelago include earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, degassing phenomena and landslides, being the cause of thousands of deaths and severe damage and loss. To reduce the impact of future events it is necessary to improve the emergency response and reinforce land-use planning, and this has given rise to the development of AZORIS, a GIS database for risk analysis in the Azores. At present this computer-based system comprises nine main dynamic data sets where elemental, monitoring and historical data are grouped in layers of first and second order. The logical structure of the database was conceived in order to facilitate interactivity between data sets and to guarantee the evolution of the system, as determined by the input and the generation of new and more detailed information. Archive organization was designed taking into account regional and local aspects of geological hazard. In order to ensure consistency of the database and the quality of the data within it, an internal process of validation was included.

Current research is paying much attention to heterojunction nanostructures. Owing to its versatile characteristics such as stimulating morphology, affluent surface-oxygen-vacancies and chemical compositions for enhanced generation of reactive oxygen species. Herein, we report the hydrothermally synthesized TiO2@MoS2 heterojunction nanostructure for the effective production of photoinduced charge carriers to enhance the photocatalytic capability. XRD analysis illustrated the crystalline size of CTAB capped TiO2, MoS2@TiO2 and L-Cysteine capped MoS2@TiO2 as 12.6, 11.7 and 10.2 nm, respectively. The bandgap of the samples analyzed by UV–Visible spectroscopy are 3.57, 3.66 and 3.94 eV. PL spectra of anatase phase titania shows the peaks present at and above 400 nm are ascribed to the defects in the crystalline structure in the form of oxygen vacancies. HRTEM reveals the existence of hexagonal layered MoS2 formation on the spherical shaped TiO2 nanoparticles at the interface. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy recommends the chemical interactions between MoS2 and TiO2, specifically, oxygen vacancies. In addition, the electrochemical impedance spectroscopy studies observed that L-MT sample performed low charge transfer resistance (336.7 Ω cm2) that promotes the migration of electrons and interfacial charge separation. The photocatalytic performance is evaluated by quantifying the rate of Congo red dye degradation under visible light irradiation, and the decomposition efficiency was found to be 97%. The electron trapping recombination and plausible photocatalytic mechanism are also explored, and the reported work could be an excellent complement for industrial wastewater treatment. © 2020, The Author(s). ; The authors (Dr. G. Ramalingam & Prof. G. Ravi) acknowledge the financial support from MHRD-SPARC (ID: 890/2019), UKIERI, DST-SERB(EEQ/2016/00198), RUSA 2.0 Grant No. F.24-51/2014-U, Policy (TN Multi-Gen) by the Government of India and UK projects. Part of this work was developed under "Smart Surfaces for Automotive Components (SMART4CAR)" Project, receiving funding from COMPETE agency, PT2020 funding program, under contract No.: POCI-01-0247-FEDER-045096. The project team members, Jordi Llobet, Helder Fonseca and Patrícia C. Sousa are also acknowledged. The author J. S. Ponraj acknowledges the funding and support from EU-EC/MSCA-COFUND-2015-FP Nano TRAIN for Growth II N°: 713640, INSPIRE Faculty Scheme (DST/INSPIRE/04/2016/000292) and SERB-EMR (EMR/2017/004764).

In this work, metal-insulator-semiconductor structures were fabricated in order to study different types of insulators, namely, aluminum oxide (Al2O3), silicon nitride, and silicon oxide (SiOx) to be used as passivation layers in Cu(In,Ga)Se-2 (CIGS) thin-film solar cells. The investigated stacks consisted of SLG/Mo/CIGS/insulator/Al. Raman scattering and photoluminescence measurements were done to verify the insulator deposition influence on the CIGS surface. In order to study the electrical properties of the CIGS-insulator interface, capacitance versus conductance and voltage (C-G-V) measurements were done to estimate the number and polarity of fixed insulator charges (Q(f)). The density of interface defects (D-it) was estimated from capacitance versus conductance and frequency (C-G-f) measurements. This study evidences that the deposition of the insulators at high temperatures (300 degrees C) and the use of a sputtering technique cause surface modification on the CIGS surface. We found that, by varying the SiOx deposition parameters, it is possible to have opposite charges inside the insulator, which would allow its use in different device architectures. The material with lower Dit values was Al2O3 when deposited by sputtering. ; This work was supported by European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme ARCIGS-M project under Grant 720887. The work of J. M. V. Cunha and P. M. P. Salome was supported by the Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia (FCT) through the project IF/00133/2015. The work of J. P. Teixeira and J. P. Leitao was supported by the FCT through the project UID/CTM/50025/2013. The work of B. Vermang was supported by the European Research Council under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant 715027.